Wait Bruno Mars wrote 'fuck you'? I would've voted for that and yeah whoever said that a hipster like myself would love Lazy Song if it was sung by Cee-lo is otm. Why is there anything wrong with that idk.

Oh I know the song is dogshit. I was just saying I'd prefer any Bruno Mars song with Cee-loo singing it instead of him. I guess the polemic was that someone upthread was debating that we should prefer the real Bruno Mars' version just because he is the composer but that is utter bollocks. Lazy Song by Bruno Mars is offensive as performance and composition and with Cee-lo it would only be offensive as composition.

Doesn't matter how many times you say it, some dude, you're on the wrong side of the "Fuck You" issue. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I'll agree about "Lazy Song," though the vehemence of the protests here doth seems too much.

Based purely on my observations, seems like women like Bruno Mars a lot more than men do. I have some ideas about what that means, but I don't know if any of them are especially relevant or true.

I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America. I loved it the first time I heard it, and so did America.

not that we need to keep re-visiting this but to clarify my earlier statements in a brief and only semi-trolling way:

1 Several female people I know focus on Bruno Mars' doo-wop voice and old-school trappings (vocal harmonies, dancing, hair) and see him as more original than, say, the average person on ILX or this thread

2 I have seen people actively angry at him for these things here, don't know what's different between the way he does this and say the retro thing of Raphael Saadiq / Janelle Monae / etc.

3 People also seem hurt that he is a very successful singer and songwriter and producer; I don't care if people don't like his songs -- I obv don't mind a few of them and actively like others -- but are we really going back to days of "fuck that guy he's a sellout" or "authenticity check" or the like?

4 I would hope people (and esp that tall drink of water some dude) wd know the minor facetiousness of my earlier comment about America but I still don't know if this is actively not liking the song or passively being pissed about success of said song

also i don't think what people dislike about him or his songs, here or elsewhere, has much to do with the old school aesthetic. the songs that get the most hate ("The Lazy Song," "Billionaire," etc.) aren't particularly old fashioned.

also where is the sellout/authenticity thing even coming from? strawmen galore over here. i think people are in general agreement that dude is talented, has a nice voice and can write a catchy tune, the dischord mainly has to do with what he actually does with that talent.

XP In re: "originality": because instead of doing what most other people are doing (hard-ass Chris Brown aggressive dancing etc) he's doing something different and not seen as much(James Brown / Sam Cooke influence) etc. Not everyone has to be Bjork to seem original yknow.

That's a fair point about "Lazy Song" and "Billionaire" (the crappiness of which is as much about Travis McCoy's basic unlikability), but doesn't address what I think is the main think people (except you!) like about "Fuck You": it sounds like an old kind of song, but it has profanities in the chorus (Lily Allen callback) AND the bridge where Cee-Lo gets E-mo in an Old-schoo way

fair enough. i don't even see where any of those bullet points even ties into the thing about women liking him more than men, but i'm not gonna drag it out if your interest in this is even more quickly evaporating than mine.

point #1 was the relevant one here. to WAY overgeneralize (like I have already done so why not continue down that path) I don't hear/see/read any women in the real world talking about "I hate that guy's guts" or "he's shitting all over his own talent" or "Grenade? more like Lemonade haha am I right?" instead, they buy the records, they actually enjoy his performances on TV, etc.

funny thing is i WANT to like him more than i do, he reminds me of a lot of people i'm a fan of, like he could be a less R&B ne-yo or a more pop patrick stump, and he seems likable enough, but his music just has very low hit rate for me.

honestly if you dont like uptown funk you prob just dont like funk, or cant bring yourself to admit that bruno mars can actually get funky in a convincing way. sure its kinda pastiche but its better than around 85% of dre3000s funk pastiches, and well funk is hard to do well in 2015 so i take my hat off to him and ronson. the first time i heard it i did think 'wow, this sounds like about 5 diff songs bolted together' but the more i hear it, i hear less joins, and just hear a superb funk record, albeit one that could have come out in 1982 and not been much different. i personally could have done without him using the b-word but thats just cos it means i cant play a song like this with my nephew. anyway, the bassline on uptown funk is more memorable than any bassline on black messiah (and i LOVE that album) in terms of retro-ish funk in 2015 (even if they are referencing quite diff periods). bruno mars actually makes me think of what van hunt would have liked to be, if van hunt didnt mind cribbing from old famous hits, and if he could write more songs that are as immediate and catchy as old famous hits.

i like "Uptown Funk" and think it's pretty well done, but i kinda feel like there's a fast approaching expiration date on it being enjoyable at all as it seeps into every movie trailer and completely saturates pop culture

Wow, that was a lot of negativity to sift through before I found something actually intelligent.

1 Several female people I know focus on Bruno Mars' doo-wop voice and old-school trappings (vocal harmonies, dancing, hair) and see him as more original than, say, the average person on ILX or this thread

2 I have seen people actively angry at him for these things here, don't know what's different between the way he does this and say the retro thing of Raphael Saadiq / Janelle Monae / etc.

3 People also seem hurt that he is a very successful singer and songwriter and producer; I don't care if people don't like his songs -- I obv don't mind a few of them and actively like others -- but are we really going back to days of "fuck that guy he's a sellout" or "authenticity check" or the like?

4 I would hope people (and esp that tall drink of water some dude) wd know the minor facetiousness of my earlier comment about America but I still don't know if this is actively not liking the song or passively being pissed about success of said song

honestly if you dont like uptown funk you prob just dont like funk, or cant bring yourself to admit that bruno mars can actually get funky in a convincing way. sure its kinda pastiche but its better than around 85% of dre3000s funk pastiches, and well funk is hard to do well in 2015 so i take my hat off to him and ronson. the first time i heard it i did think 'wow, this sounds like about 5 diff songs bolted together' but the more i hear it, i hear less joins, and just hear a superb funk record, albeit one that could have come out in 1982 and not been much different. i personally could have done without him using the b-word but thats just cos it means i cant play a song like this with my nephew. anyway, the bassline on uptown funk is more memorable than any bassline on black messiah (and i LOVE that album) in terms of retro-ish funk in 2015 (even if they are referencing quite diff periods). bruno mars actually makes me think of what van hunt would have liked to be, if van hunt didnt mind cribbing from old famous hits, and if he could write more songs that are as immediate and catchy as old famous hits.― StillAdvance, Sunday, 18 January 2015 11:23 (2 days ago) Permalink

i like "Uptown Funk" and think it's pretty well done, but i kinda feel like there's a fast approaching expiration date on it being enjoyable at all as it seeps into every movie trailer and completely saturates pop culture

― some dude, Sunday, 18 January 2015 13:54 (2 days ago) Permalink

Bruno Mars is a talented songwriter (if you don't agree then just admit you don't like pop and be okay with it, it's really not a big deal) and an impressive fucking performer (e.g. Superbowl Halftime 2014, he fucking killed it--that's when I knew he was going to really do something big in his career, don't believe me, just watch: )

That's ridiculous. Funk music owes it's life to James Brown. You can't bag on Bruno Mars just for being influenced by James Brown and if he wants to mirror his performances after James Brown performances I don't think that's the worst thing in the world. James Brown put on a damn good show. If music isn't supposed to live on in other musicians then tell Kevin Parker he'll never be John Lennon... he hasn't figured it out yet.

"the worst of these are seriously some of the most atrocious songs of my lifetime"

This resonates. "the Lazy Song", "When I Was Your Man", "Just The Way You Are", "Marry You", "Billionaire" - this is a trail of devastation with few parallels. Mars does actually remind me a bit of Billy Joel, in that he tends to write the kind of songs that one could imagine a really irritatingly precocious 10 year old coming up with and being really pleased with.

xp to the guy upthread who doesn't like the "language in Uptown Funk: the radio edit says "trick" instead of "bitch" so you can play that version for your nephew (although is a prostitution reference any better than a common meaningless swear word, despite the former somehow being less explicit in our culture?)

IMO Uptown Funk is a bit too knowing for me to enjoy it unconditionally, but it is damn catchy. But the firs time I heard it I was in the car with my mom and she went "ooh I like this, this sounds so 70s" and to me it sounds like thats exactly what Mars and Ronson wanted. I like throwbacks, but such self-conscious, purposeful, targeted throwbacks leave a bad taste in my mouth.